March 27: Gloaming Wednesday, Backasswards, Houses of Friends

"God damn it."  He was sore as hell.  He was really furious.  "You always do everything backasswards."  He looked at me.  "No wonder you're flunking the hell out of here," he said.  "You don't do one damn thing the way you're supposed to.  I mean it.  Not one damn thing."

Stradlater, Holden's dorm mate, is pissed at Holden.  Holden has written en essay for Stradlater's English class.  Being Holden, he has not followed the directions Stradlater gave him to write something "descriptive as hell."  He was supposed to write about a place.  Instead, Holden wrote about his dead brother's baseball mitt, and now Stradlater is taking him to task.


It's the day before Maunday Thursday and the whole start of the Easter Triduum.  My name for this day is Gloaming Wednesday.  "Gloaming" is defined as "the time of day immediately following sunset."  It's been one of my favorite words for a long time.  I like the sound of it, the feel of it on my tongue.  It's a pleasant word.  The reason I'm using it to refer to the day before Maunday Thursday is that it has a gentle finality.  Christ's life is coming to an end.  The sun has set.  There's a sense of gathering darkness.  Yet, today/tonight is the calm before the chaos of the next 72 hours.  I think "gloaming" describes this time perfectly.

The passage I opened with appears at the gloaming of Holden's tenure as a student at Pencey Prep.  In a few words, Stradlater is able sum up one of Holden's major flaws (or strengths) as a person:  he does everything "backasswards," or, to put it nicely, he doesn't follow directions well.  Holden is an original thinker.  He doesn't buy into the whole prep-school mentality and doesn't aspire to be successful in that "phony" way.

I have never been successful in any sense of the definition of the word "success."  Yes, I've published a book.  Yes, I teach at a university.  And, yes, I have two post-graduate degrees with another three years work toward a PhD.  Perhaps I appear successful to some people.  However, I only teach part-time at the college; I hold down three or so jobs to pay the bills (which barely happens most weeks); and my Master's in Fiction and MFA in Poetry simply qualify me to write about making french fries at McDonald's with style.

Most days, I'm in a constant state of self-abuse (and not in a good way) about my lack of success.  If I had only finished my PhD and interviewed at a university that was looking for an itinerant specialist in 20th century American lit, I might be more successful today.  Perhaps I would own a house like the houses of my tenured friends in the English Department--big, sprawling, five-bedroom, three-bathroom fixer-uppers that they can afford to fix-up.  Perhaps I would go on vacations to Hawaii or Europe once a year.  (At this point in time, I'm happy for a weekend at the Holiday Inn.)  And perhaps I wouldn't feel quite so gloaming today, like I'm heading into the twilight of a mildly successful career as a mediocre writer and part-time professor.  Maybe I am a grown-up Holden Caulfield.

Yes, I've done things backasswards in my life, but I do have a beautiful wife and two gorgeous kids.  I have friends I adore and who adore me.  My house is a two-bedroom, one-bathroom fixer-upper that I can't afford to fix-up, but I have a house.  And I'm able to teach classes in poetry and film and literature and get paid for it.

Saint Marty guesses that's not such a bad gloaming after all.

Care to join me for a stroll in the gloaming?